Ervin Laszlo
http://goertzel.org/dynapsyc/1996/subtle.htmlThe International Society for the
Systems
Sciences and
The Club of Budapest Copyright Ervin Laszlo 1996

Are human beings entirely discrete
individuals, their
organism enclosed by the skin and their minds enclosed by the cranium
housing
the brain? Or are there effective, if subtle, interconnections between
humans — and between humans and the world at large? This study argues
that
the latter assumption is likely to be true. Though the evidence for
"subtle
connections" is not in the form of incontrovertible "hard data" it is
nevertheless
cogent and significant. The directly pertinent findings are generated
by
research on psi- phenomena and the practice of psychotherapists.
Possible
explanations for the findings can be traced to the ideas of Carl Jung,
and are now pursued at the leading edge of the physical sciences.

The Findings: (i) Psi experiments Controlled experiments concerning subtle
connections
between subjects removed in space, and occasionally also in time, date
back to back to the 1930s, to J.B. Rhine's pioneering card-and
dice-guessing
work at Duke University. Since then experimental designs have become
sophisticated
and experimental controls rigorous; physicists have often joined
psychologists
in carrying out the tests. Explanations in terms of hidden sensory
cues,
machine bias, cheating by subjects, and experimenter error or
incompetence
have all been considered, but they were found unable to account for a
number
of statistically significant results.

Relevant work began in the 1970s, when Russell
Targ and
Harold Puthoff carried out some of the best known experiments on subtle
connections among distant subjects in regard to the transference of
thoughts
and images. They examined the possibility of telepathic transmission
between
individuals, one of whom would act as "sender" and the other as
"receiver."
The receiver was placed in a sealed, opaque and electrically shielded
chamber,
while the sender was in another room where he or she was subjected to
bright
flashes of light at regular intervals. Electroencephalograph (EEG)
machines
registered the brain- wave patterns of both. As expected, the sender
exhibited
the rhythmic brain waves that normally accompany exposure to bright
flashes
of light. But, after a brief interval the receiver also began to
produce
the same patterns, although he or she was not exposed to the flashes
and
was not receiving sense-perceivable signals from the sender.

Targ and Puthoff also conducted experiments on
remote
viewing. In these tests sender and receiver were separated by distances
that precluded any form of sensory communication between them. At a
site
chosen at random, the sender acted as a "beacon"; the receiver then
tried
to pick up what the beacon saw. To document his or her impressions, the
receiver gave verbal descriptions, at times accompanied by sketches.
Independent
judges found that the descriptions of the sketches matched on the
average
66 percent of the time the characteristics of the site that was
actually
seen by the beacon.[1]

Remote viewing experiments reported from other
laboratories
involved distances from half a mile to several thousand miles.
Regardless
of where they were carried out, and by whom, the success rate was
generally
around fifty percent — considerably above random probability. The most
successful viewers appeared to be those who were relaxed, attentive,
and
meditative. They reported that they received a preliminary impression
as
a gentle and fleeting form which gradually evolved into an integrated
image.
They experienced the image as a surprise, both because it was clear and
because it was clearly elsewhere.

Images could also be transmitted while the
receiver is
asleep. Over several decades, Stanley Krippner and his associates
carried
out "dream ESP experiments" at the Dream Laboratory of Maimondes
Hospital
in New York City.[2]
The experiments followed a simple yet effective protocol. The
volunteer,
who would spend the night at the laboratory, would meet the sender and
the experimenters on arrival and had the procedure explained to him or
her. Electrodes were then attached to the volunteer's head to monitor
brain
waves and eye movements; there was no further sensory contact with the
sender until the next morning. One of the experimenters threw dice
that,
in combination with a random number table, gave a number that
corresponded
to a sealed envelope containing an art print. The envelope was opened
when
the sender reached his or her private room in a distant part of the
hospital.
The sender then spent the night concentrating on the print.

The experimenters woke the volunteers by
intercom
when the monitor showed the end of a period of rapid eye-movement (REM)
sleep. The subject was then asked to describe any dream he or she might
have had before awakening. The comments were recorded, together with
the
contents of an interview the next morning when the subject was asked to
associate with the remembered dreams. The interview was conducted
double
blind — neither the subject nor the experimenters knew which art print
had been selected the night before.

Using data taken from the first night that
each volunteer
spent at the dream laboratory, the series of experiments between 1964
and
1969 produced 62 nights of data for analysis. They exhibited a
significant
correlation between the art print selected for a given night and the
recipient's
dreams on that night. The score was considerably higher on nights when
there were few or no electrical storms in the area and sunspot activity
was at a low ebb — that is, when the Earth's geomagnetic field was
relatively
undisturbed.

A particularly striking example of
transpersonal contact
and com-munication has been the work of Jacobo Grinberg-Zylverbaum at
the
National University of Mexico.[3]
In more than fifty experiments performed over five years,
Grinberg-Zylberbaum
paired his subjects inside sound-and electro-magnetic radiation-proof
"Faraday
cages." He asked them to meditate together for twenty minutes. Then he
placed the subjects in separate Faraday cages where one of them was
stimulated
and the other not. The stimulated subject received stimuli at random
intervals
in suh a way that neither he or she, nor the experimenter, knew when
they
were applied. The non-stimulated subject remained relaxed, with eyes
closed,
instructed to feel the presence of the partner without knowing anything
about his or her stimulation.

In general, a series of one hundred stimuli
were applied
— flashes of light, sounds, or short, intense but not painful electric
shocks to the index and ring fingers of the right hand. The EEG of both
subjects was then synchronized and examined for "normal" potentials
evoked
in the stimulated subject and "transferred" potentials in the
non-stimulated
subject. Transferred potentials were not found in control situations
where
there was either no stimulated subject; or when a screen prevented the
stimulated subject from perceiving the stimuli (such as light flashes);
or else when the paired subjects did not previously interact. However,
in experimental situations with stimulated subjects and with
interaction,
the transferred potentials appeared consistently in some 25 percent of
the cases. A particularly poignant example was furnished by a young
couple,
deeply in love. Their EEG patterns remained closely synchronized
throughout
the experiment, testifying to their report of feeling a deep oneness.

In a limited way, Grinberg-Zylberbaum could
also replicate
his results. When a subject exhibited the transferred potentials in one
experiment, he or she usually exhibited them in subsequent experiments
as well.

A related experiment investigated the degree
of harmonization
of the left and right hemispheres of the subject's neocortex. In
ordinary
waking consciousness the two hemispheres — the language-oriented,
linearly
thinking rational "left brain" and the gestalt-perceiving intuitive
"right
brain" — exhibit uncoordinated, randomly diverging wavepatterns in the
electroencelograph. When the subject enters a meditative state of
conscious-ness,
these patterns become synchronized, and in deep meditation the two
hemispheres
fall into a nearly identical pattern. In deep meditation not only the
left
and right brains of one and the same subject, also the left and right
brains
of different subjects manifest identical patterns. Experiments with up
to twelve subjects simultaneously showed an astonishing synchronization
of the brain-waves of the entire group.[4]

In the past few years experiments such
as these
have been matched by hundreds of others. They provide significant
evidence
that identifiable and consistent electrical signals occur in the brain
of one person when a second person, especially if he or she is closely
related or emotionally linked, is either meditating, or provided with
sensory
stimulation, or attempts to communicate with the subject
intentionally.[5]
(see Larry Dossey, Recovering the
the Soul: A Scientific and_Spiritual
Search, New York, Bantam 1989; ——, Healing Words: The Power of
Prayer
and the Practice of Medicine, Harper San Francisco, 1993; W. Braud
and M. Schlitz, "Psychokinetic influence on electrodermal activity," Journal
of Parapsychology, Vol. 47, 1983; Mario Varvoglis, "Goal-directed-
and observer-dependent PK: An evaluation of the conformance-behavior
model
and the observation theories," The Journal of the American Society
for
Psychical Research, 80 (1986); R. Rosenthal, "Combining results of
independent studies," Psychological Bulletin, 85(1978); C.
Honorton,
R. Berger, M. Varvoglis, M. Quant., P. Derr, E. Schechter, and D.
Ferrari,
'Psi-communication in the Ganzfeld: Experiments with an automated
testing
system and a comparison with a meta-analysis of earlier studies.' Journal
of Parapsychology, 54 (1990).)

Interpersonal connection beyond the sensory
range can
also occur outside the laboratory; it is particularly frequent among
identical
twins. In many cases one twin feels the pain suffered by the other, and
is aware of traumas and crises even if he or she is halfway around the
world. Besides "twin pain," the sensitivity of mothers and lovers is
equally
noteworthy: countless stories are recounted of mothers having known
when
their son or daugther was in grave danger, or was actually involved in
an accident.

Interpersonal connection is not limited to
twins, mothers
and lovers: the kind of closeness that a therapeutic relationship
creates
between therapist and patient seems also to suffice. A number of
psychotherapists
have noted that, during a session, they experience memories, feelings,
attitudes, and associations that are outside the normal scope of their
experience and personality. At the time these strange items are
experienced
they are indistinguishable from the memories, feelings and related
sentiments
of the therapists themselves; it is only later, on reflection, that
they
come to realize that the anomalous items stem not from their own life
and
experience, but from their patient.

It appears that in the course of the
therapeutic relationship
some aspect of the patient's psyche is projected into the mind of the
therapist.
In that location, at least for a limited time, it integrates with the
therapist's
own psyche and produces an awareness of some of the patient's memories,
feeling, and associations. Known as "projective identification," the
transference
can be useful in the context of therapy: it can permit the patient to
view
what was previously a painful element in his or her personal
consciousness
more objectively, as if it belonged to somebody else.

Actual bodily effects seem also capable of
being transmitted
from one individual to another. Transmissions of this kind came to be
known
as "telesomatic": they consist of physiological changes that are
triggered
in the targeted person by the mental processes of another. [6]
The distance between the individuals involved seems to make little or
no
difference. William Braud and Marilyn Schlitz carried out hundreds of
trials
regarding the impact of the mental imagery of senders on the physiology
of receivers — the latter were distant, and unaware that such imagery
was
being directed to them. They claim that the mental images of the sender
can "reach out" over space and cause changes in the physiology of the
distant
receiver — effects comparable to those one's own mental processes
produce
in one's own body. People who attempt to influence their own bodily
functions
are only slightly more effective than those who attempt to influence
the
physiology of others from a distance. Over several cases involving a
large
number of individuals, the difference between remote influence and
self-influence
was almost insignificant: "telesomatic" influence by a distant person
proved
to be nearly as effective as "psychosomatic" influence by the same
person.

The Findings: (ii) Grof's experience with
altered states
of consciousness Complementing psi-experiments in regard to
the
ability of the human mind to penetrate beyond the limits of personal
sensory
experience are the findings of modern psychotherapists. The pertinent
evidence
comes clearly to the fore in the work of
Stanislav Grof. In reviewing findings
gathered in the course of over three decades, Grof suggests that the
standard
cartography of the human mind needs to be completed with additional
elements.
To the standard "biographic-recollective" domain of the psyche we
should
add a "perinatal" and a "transpersonal" domain. The transpersonal
domain,
it appears, can mediate connection between our mind and practically any
part or aspect of the phenomenal world.[7]

Grof's experience derives from work with
non-ordinary
"altered" states of consciousness (ASCs) induced in his patients either
by psychedelic drugs or holotropic breathing. ASCs embrace a large part
of the human psyche; the states of normal waking consciousness are but
the tip of the iceberg. As over a hundred years ago William James had
noted,
"Our normal waking consciousness...is but one special type of
consciousness,
whilst all about it, parted from it by the filmiest of screens, there
lie
potential forms of consciousness entirely different. We may go through
life without suspecting their existence; but apply the requisite
stimulus,
and at a touch they are all there in all their completeness."[8]
People in "primitive" and classical cultures knew how to apply the
requisite
stimulus — some tribes, such as the !Kung Bushmen of the Kalahari
desert,
could enter altered states all at the same time. In many parts of the
world
ancient peoples combined chanting, breathing, drumming, rhythmic
dancing,
fasting, social and sensory isolation, even specific forms of physical
pain to induce altered states. The native cultures of Africa and
pre-Colombian
America used them in shamanic procedures, healing ceremonies and rites
of passage; the high-cultures of Asia used them in various systems of
yoga,
Vipassana or Zen Buddhism, Tibetan Vajrayana, Taoism, and Sufism. The
semitic
cultures used them in Cabalah, the ancient Egyptians in the temple
initiations
of Isis and Osiris; the classical Greeks in Bacchanalia and the rites
of
Attis and Adonis as well as in the Eleusinian mysteries. Until the
advent
of Western industrial civilization, almost all cultures held such
states
in high esteem for the remarkable experiences they convey and the
powers
of personal healing and interpersonal contact and communication they
render
accessible.[9]

Today, at the leading edge of the contemporary
sciences,
research on altered states of consciousness is becoming accepted as a
legitimate
part of the new discipline known as "consciousness research." The
insight
that surfaces is, as Charles Tart noted,
that altered states tend to make
our connections to each other and to our environment more evident.
Grof's
records of the verbal reports of his patients makes this very clear.
[10]

In the "experience of dual unity" a patient in
an ASC
experiences a loosening and melting of the boundaries of the body ego
and
a sense of merging with another person in a state of unity and oneness.
In this experience, despite the feeling of being fused with another,
the
patient retains an awareness of his or her own identity. Then, in the
experience
of "identification with other persons," the patient, while merging
experientially
with another person, has a sense of complete identification to the
point
of losing the awareness of his or her own identity. Identification is
total
and complex, involving body image, physical sensations, emotional
reactions
and attitudes, thought processes, memories, facial expression, typical
gestures and mannerisms, postures, movement, and even the inflection of
the voice. The "other" (or others) can be someone in the presence of
the
patient or someone absent; he or she can be part of an experience from
the subject's childhood, his or her ancestry, or even of a previous
lifetime.

In "group identification and group
consciousness" there
is a further extension of consciousness and melting of ego boundaries.
Rather than identifying with individual persons, the patient has a
sense
of becoming an entire group of people who share some racial, cultural,
national, ideological, political, or professional characteristics. The
depth, scope, and intensity of this experience can reach extraordinary
proportions: people may experience the totality of suffering of all the
soldiers who have ever died on the battlefield since the beginning of
history,
the desire of revolutionaries of all ages to overthrow a tyrant, or the
love, tenderness and dedication of all mothers in regard to their
babies.
Identification can focus on a social or political group, the people of
an entire country or continent, all members of a race, or all believers
of a religion.

"Identification with animals" goes beyond the
human transpersonal
dimension: it involves a complete and realistic identification with
members
of various animal species. The experience can be authentic and
convincing,
including body image, specific physiological sensations, instinctual
drives,
unique perceptions of the environment, and the corresponding emotional
reactions. The nature and scope of these experiences distinguish them
from
ordinary human experiences; they often transcend the scope of fantasy
and
imagination.

While less frequent, "identification with
plants and botanical
processes" occurs as well. On occasion patients have a complex
experience
of becoming a tree, a wild or garden flower, a carnivorous plant, kelp,
Volvox globator, plankton in the ocean, a bacterial culture, or an
individual
bacterium. In the still more embracing experience of "oneness with life
and all creation" an individual expands his or her consciousness to
such
an extent that it encompasses the totality of life on this planet,
including
all of humanity and all the flora and fauna of the biosphere. Instead
of
identification with one living organism, the patient identifies with
life
itself as a cosmic phenomenon.

Experience in ASCs can also penetrate beyond
the sphere
of life: it can include the macroscopic and microscopic phenomena of
the
inorganic world. In the "experience of inanimate matter and inorganic
processes"
patients report experiential identification with the waters of rivers
and
oceans, with various forms of fire, with the earth and with mountains,
and with the forces unleashed in natural catastrophes such as electric
storms, earthquakes, tornadoes, and volcanic eruptions. They can
identify
with specific materials, such as diamonds and other precious stones,
quartz
crystals, amber, granite, iron, steel, quicksilver, silver, and gold.
The
experiences extend into the microworld and may involve the dynamic
structure
of molecules and atoms, Brownian motions, interatomic bonds,
electromagnetic
forces, and subatomic particles. Grof concludes that every process in
the
universe that in an ordinary state of consciousness can be objectively
observed, can also be subjectively experienced in an altered state.

The cosmic dimensions of altered-state
experiences can
encompass all of the planet Earth. In "planetary consciousness" the
subject's
consciousness expands to the Earth's geological substance with its
mineral
kingdom, and its biosphere with all its life forms. The Earth as a
whole
appears to be one complex organism, oriented toward its own evolution,
integration, and self-actualization. In "extraterrestrial experiences"
— a further expanded form of consciousness — other celestial bodies and
astronomical processes are included. The subject can experience
travelling
to the moon, sun, other planets, stars, and galaxies; he or she can
experience
explosions of supernovas, contraction of stars, quasars and pulsars,
even
passage through black holes. The experience can occur in the form of
simply
witnessing such events, or of actually becoming them, experiencing them
intimately, as if being a part of the experienced thing or event. At
the
widest (and comparatively rare) form of this experience —
"identification
with the entire physical universe" — the subject has the feeling that
his
or her consciousness encompasses the entire cosmos. All its processes
are
experienced as part of the organism and psyche of the all-encompassing
universe-system.

In addition to the spatially expanded forms of
consciousness,
there are experiences that recall OBEs (out-of-body experiences),
clairvoyance,
clairaudience, and telepathy. More relevant for our purposes are
experiences
involving a displacement in time. Time-displacement experiences range
from
"embryonal and fetal experiences," where the subject recalls his or her
intrauterine experiences as a fetus, through "ancestral experiences"
involving
identification with one's biological ancestors, "racial and collective
experiences" where those involved are not one's direct ancestors but
members
of the same race, or sometimes the entire human species (suggestive of
Jung's "collective unconscious" of which more will be said later), all
the way to "past incarnation experiences." The essential characteristic
of the latter is a convinced sense of remembering something that had
already
happened to oneself. Subjects maintain their sense of individuality and
personal identity, but experience themselves in another form, at
another
place and time, and in another context. In these reincarnation- type
experiences
the birth of the individual appears as a point of transformation, where
the enduring record of multiple lifetimes enters the bio- psychological
life of the individual.

According to Grof the memories that surface in
past incarnation
experiences share with other transpersonal experiences the capacity to
provide instant and direct extrasensory access to information about
some
aspect of the world. If so, all divisions and boundaries in the
universe
are illusory and arbitrary; in the last analysis it is only a cosmic
consciousness
that actually exists.[11]

Toward an Explanation: (a) Jung's unus
mundus What explanation can we give for the varied
yet
remarkably consistent phenomena unearthed in controlled psi-
experiments
and in the work of Grof and other psychotherapists with patients in
altered
states of consciousness? Just what is the nature of the "cosmic
consciousness"
— or similar factor — that would connect our psyche with the world at
large?

Carl Jung, fascinated with this seemingly
esoteric aspect
of the human psyche, attempted an explanation in terms of a higher or
deeper
reality that would connect human minds with each other as well as with
physical reality. He was led to his explanatory concept by a comparison
of unconscious processes in individuals with the myths, legends and
folktales
of a variety of cultures at various periods of history. Jung found that
the individual records and the collective material contain common
themes.
This prompted him to postulate the existence of a collective aspect of
the pysche: the "collective unconscious." The dynamic principles that
organize
this material are the "archetypes." Archetypes are irrepresentable in
themselves,
but have effects that make visualizations possible: these are the
archetypal
images and ideas.[12]
"The archetype as such is a psychoid factor that belongs, as it were,
to
the invisible, ultraviolet end of the psychic spectrum. It does not
appear,
in itself, to be capable of reaching consciousness."[13]

While in the realm of the spirit, at the
upper, "ultraviolet"
end of the psychic spectrum, archetypes are dynamic organizers of ideas
and images, at the lower, "infrared" end of the spectrum the biological
instinctual psyche shades into the physiology of the organism, merging
with its chemical and physical conditions. As Jung noted, "...the
position
of the archetype would be located beyond the psychic sphere, analogous
to the position of physiological instinct, which is immediately rooted
in the stuff of the organism and, with its psychoid nature, forms the
bridge
to matter in general.[14]

Jung formulated his concept of the archetype
in collaboration
with Wolfgang Pauli. He was struck by the fact that while his own
research
into the human psyche led to an encounter with such "irrepresentables"
as the archetypes, research in quantum physics had likewise led to
"irrepresentables":
the micro- particles of the physical universe, entities for which no
complete
description appeared possible.

Jung concluded, "When the existence of two or
more irrepresentables
is assumed, there is always the possibility — which we tend to overlook
— that it may not be a question of two or more factors but of one
only."[15]
The single factor that underlies the irrepresentables of physics and of
psychology may be the same as that which underlies the synchronicites
Jung
had investigated: meaningful coincidences that tie together in an
acausal
connectedness the physical and the psychological worlds. The common
factor
that would underlie and connect these worlds Jung named "unus mundus."
The foundation for the unus mundus is "...that the multiplicity
of the empirical world rests on an underlying unity, and that not two
or
more fundamentally different worlds exist side- by- side or are mingled
with one another."[16]

As Charles Card summarized, "The realms of
mind and of
matter—psyche and physis— are complementary aspects of
the
same transcendental reality, the unus mundus. Archetypes act as
the fundamental dynamical patterns whose various representations
characterize
all processes, whether mental or physical. In the realm of the psyche,
archetypes organize images and ideas. In the realm of physis,
they
organize the structure and transformations of matter and energy, and
they
account for acausal orderedness as well. Archetypes acting
simultaneously
in both the realms of psyche and physis account for
instances
of synchronistic phenomena."[17]

Jung's relates the subtle connections that
appear in synchronistic
events involving the psyche of different individuals, as well as the
psyche
of one person and the physical world around that person, to an
underlying
reality that emerges in the form of archetypes. The fundamental reality
— the unus mundus — is itself neither psychic nor physical: it
stands
above, or lies beyond, both psyche and physis.

Toward an Explanation: (b) The Quantum
Vacuum Jung's concept points the way toward a
fruitful
avenue of research: a deeper reality that connects mind and mind, and
mind
and matter. This approach should enter the current stream of
consciousness
research. For the present, most researchers seek an explanation of
mental
events mainly in terms of physical processes in the brain. But
henceforth
the mental events to explain should include not only the workings of
the
individual brain but, in light of the findings of psi- experimenters
and
psychotherapists, the subtle connections that link human brains with
each
other and with the world at large.

It seems likely that world and brain — cosmos
and consciousness
— are interconnected by a continuous information- conserving and
transmitting field.18——
(see The Interconnected Universe. World Scientific, Singapore
and
London, 1995; ——, The Whispering Pond. Element Books, London
and
New York, 1996 (in press).) Such a field cannot be postulated in an ad
hoc manner — science must respect the law laid down by William of Occam
in the 14th century: entities are not to be multiplied beyond
necessity.
New entities — which can also be forces or fields — can only be
postulated
when doing so is the simplest, the most economical and
the
most rational way of explaining a given set of findings and
observations.

A field that constitutes the simplest, the
most economical
and rational explanation of the current findings may exist: David Bohm,
the same as this writer, suggested that it is the as yet imperfectly
understood
"zero- point field" (ZPF) that seems present throughout the quantum
vacuum.
In the following we shall explore what is known about this field of the
vacuum, what is currently hypothesized about it, and how it could
account
for the subtle interconnections noted above.

Received knowledge about the vacuum - -
In quantum
physics the quantum vacuum is defined as the lowest energy state of a
system
of which the equations obey wave mechanics and special relativity. It
is
considerably more than just the state of a system, however. It is the
locus
of a vast energy field that is neither classically electromagnetic nor
gravitational, nor yet nuclear in nature. Instead, it is the
originating
source of the known electromagnetic, gravitational, and nuclear forces
and fields. It is the originating source of matter itself.

The technical definitions of the quantum
vacuum point
to a continuous energy sea in which particles of matter are specific
substructures.
According to Paul Dirac's calculation, all particles in positive energy
states have negative- energy counterparts (by now such "antiparticles"
have been found experi- mentally for all presently known particles).
The
zero- ppoint field of the quantum vacuum is a "Dirac- sea": a sea of
particles
in the negative energy state. These particles are not observable —
physicists
call them "virtual." But they are not fictional for all that. By
stimulating
the negative energy states of the ZPF with sufficient energy (of the
order
of 10- 27 erg), a particular region of it can be "kicked"
into
the real (that is, observable) state of positive energy. This is the
process
known as pair- creation: out of the vacuum emerges a positive energy
(real)
particle, with a negative energy (virtual) particle remaining in it.
Thus
the Dirac- sea is everywhere; the observable universe floats, as it
were,
on its surface.

The quantum vacuum contains a staggering
density of energy.
John Wheeler estimated its matter- equivalent at 1094 gram
per
cm3 — and that is more than all the matter in the universe
put
together. Compared with this energy density, the energy of the nucleus
of the atom — the most energetic chunk of matter in the known universe
— seems almost minuscule: it is "merely" 1014 gram/cm3.

The vacuum itself is not material: its zero-
point energies
— which, according to David Bohm, exceed all the energies bound in
matter
1040 times — are in the negative state. This is fortunate,
for
if they were not, the universe would instantly collapse to a size
smaller
than the radius of an atom. (This follows from E = mc2,
Einstein's
celebrated mass- energy equivalence relation: energy corresponds to
mass,
and mass in turn entails gravitation.)

Because the "real" world of matter — that is,
of energy
bound in mass — is so much less energetic than the vacuum, the
observable
universe is not a solid condensate floating on top of the vacuum, but
like
a set of bubbles suspended in it. In terms of energy, the material
world
is not a solidification of the quantum vacuum, but a thinning
of it.

Speculations on the vacuum - - A thin
line divides
what is already known and accepted about the quantum vacuum and what is
still speculative and controversial. Here we review the relevant
explorations:
those that concern interactions between the observable world of matter-
energy and the vacuum's zero- point energies.

The world of matter and the quantum vacuum are
known to
interact. For example, under certain conditions vacuum's zero- point
energies
act on electrons orbiting atomic nuclei. The effects occur when
electrons
"jump" from one energy state to another: the photons they emit exhibit
the so- called Lamb- shift (a frequency slightly shifted from its
normal
value). Vacuum energies also create a radiation pressure on two closely
spaced metal plates. Between the plates some wavelengths of the vacuum
field are excluded, thereby reducing its energy density with respect to
the field outside. This creates a pressure — known as the Casimir
effect
— that pushes the plates inward and together.

Other interactions may exist as well. Some
years ago Hungarian
physicist Lajos Jánossy assigned "relativistic effects" (such as
the slowing down of clocks when accelerated close to the speed of
light,
or the increasing of the mass of objects at those velocities) to the
interaction
of realworld objects with the vacuum's energy field. Close to the speed
of light the matter- particles of objects rub against the force-
particles
(bosons) of the vacuum, and this friction slows down their processes
and
increases their mass. In this concept the ZPF of the vacuum is a
physical
field that interacts with the objects that move in space and time.

In his theory the vacuum's energy field has
the properties
of a superfluid. It is known that in supercooled helium all resistance
and friction ceases; it moves through narrow cracks and capilleries
without
loss of momentum. Conversely, objects move through the fluid without
encountering
resistance. (Since also electrons move through it without resistance,
superfluids
are also superconductors.) Thus, in a sense, a superconducting
superfluid
is not "there" for the objects or electrons that move through it — they
get no information about its presence. This could explain why we, and
even
our most sensitive instruments, fail to register its presence.

In Gazdag's reinterpretation of
Einstein's relativity
theory the celebrated formulas describe the flow of bosons in the
superfluid
ZPF.This flow is what determines the geometrical structure
of spacetime, and hence the trajectory of realworld photons and
electrons.
When particles of light and matter move uniformly, spacetime is
Euclidean;
when they are accelerated the ZPF interacts with their motion. Then
spacetime
appears curved. (As Russian physicist Piotr Kapitza noted, in a
superfluid
only those objects move without friction that are in constant quasi-
uniform
motion. If an object is strongly accelerated, vortices are created in
the
medium and these vortices produce resistance: the classical interaction
effects surface.)

Front- line research in physics confirms the
basic notion
that underlies these assumptions. Current work follows up a suggestion
made by physicists Paul Davies and William Unruh in the mid- 1970s.
Davies
and Unruh, like Jánossy and Gazdag, based their argument on the
difference between constant- speed and accelerated motion in the
vacuum's
zero- point field. Constant- speed motion would exhibit the vacuum's
spectrum
as isotropic (the same in all directions), whereas accelerated motion
would
produce a thermal radiation that breaks open the directional symmetry.
The "Davies- Unruh effect," too small to be measured with physical
instruments,
prompted scientists to investigate whether accelerated motion through
the
vacuum field would produce incremental effects. This expectation has
borne
fruit. It turned out that the inertial force itself could be due to
interactions
in that field.

In 1994 Bernhard Haisch, Alfonso Rueda
and
Harold
Puthoff gave a mathematical demonstration that inertia can be
considered
a vacuum-based Lorentz- force.[20]
The force originates at the subparticle level and produces opposition
to
the acceleration of material objects.The accelerated
motion
of objects through the vacuum produces a magnetic field, and the
particles
that constitute the objects are deflected by this field. The larger the
object the more particles it contains, hence the stronger the
deflection
— and greater the inertia. Inertia is thus a form of electromagnetic
resistance
arising in accelerated frames from the distortion of the zero- point
(and
otherwise superfluid) field of the vacuum.

More than inertia, also mass appears to
be a product
of vacuum inter- action. If Haisch and collaborators are right, the
concept
of mass is neither fundamental nor even necessary in physics. When the
massless electric charges of the vacuum (the bosons that make up the
superfluid
zero- point field) interact with the electromagnetic field, beyond the
already noted threshold of energy, mass is effectively "created." Thus
mass may be a structure condensed from vacuum energy, rather than a
fundamental
given in the universe.

If mass is a product of vacuum energy,
so is gravitation.
Gravity, as we know, is always associated with mass, obeying the
inverse
square law (it drops off proportionately to the square of the distance
between the gravitating masses). Hence if mass is produced in
interaction
with the ZPF, then also the force that is associated with mass must be
so produced. This, however, means that all the fundamental
characteristics
we normally associate with matter are vacuum field- interaction
products:
inertia, mass, as well as gravity.

In regard to the full scale of interactions
between vacuum
energies and the micro- as well as macro- world of matter- energy, the
work of a group of Russian physicists is of particular significance.
Anatoly
Akimov, G.I. Shipov, V.N. Binghi and co- workers developed a
sophisticated
theory of what they call the "physical vacuum." In their theory the
vacuum
is a real physical field extending throughout the universe: it
registers
and transmits the traces of both micro- particles and macro-
objects.[21]Anatoly
Akimov, "Heuristic discussion of the problem of finding long- range
interactions.
EGS- Concepts." Center of Intersectoral Science, Engineering and
Venture,
Non- Conventional Technologies (CISE VENT), Preprint No. 74, Moscow
1991.

The theory, which at the time of writing has
not been
published outside Russia, is important and fascinating enough to merit
some further details.

In standard theories the energetic properties
of the quantum
vacuum are generally considered in the framework of quantum
electrodynamics.
This framework gives rise to elegant and relatively simple mathematics.
But such formulas, though highly sophisticated, can be misleading: they
may not provide the best possible account of physical reality.
Stochastic
electro- dynamics, for example, produces a more "messy" math, but its
tenets
about the real world may be closer to realistic assumptions about the
nature
of reality. In any case, quantum electrodynamics, as other scientific
theories,
can always be reconsidered or extended.

The Russian physicists do not hesitate to
undertake this
step. They take their cue from earlier work by Einstein. In a seminal
treatment,
G.I. Shiphov showed that in accordance with the Clifford- Einstein
program
of the geometrization of spacetime, the vacuum can be described not
only
in terms of Riemannian (four- dimensional) curvature, but also in terms
of Cartan torsion. In the 1920s studies carried out by Albert Einstein
and E. Cartan laid the foundation of the theory that became subsequent
known as the ECT (Einstein- Cartan Theory). The idea stemmed originally
from Cartan, who at the beginning of the century speculated about
fields
generated by angular momentum density. This idea was later elaborated
independently
by a number of Russian physicists, including N. Myshkin and V. Belyaev.
They claim to have discovered the natural manifestations of enduring
torsion
fields.

Presently Akimov and his team consider the
quantum vacuum
as a universal torsion wave carrying medium. The torsion field is said
to fill all of space isotropically, including its matter component. It
has a quantal structure that is unobservable in non- disturbed states.
However, violations of vacuum symmetry and invariance create different,
and in principle observable, states.

The torsion field
theory takes a modified form of the
original electron- positron model of the "Dirac- sea": the vacuum's
energy
field is viewed as a system of rotating wave packets of electrons and
positrons
(rather than a sea of electron- positron pairs). Where the wave-
packets
are mutually embedded, the field is electrically neutral. If the spins
of the embedded packets have the opposite sign, the system is
compensated
not only in charge, but also in classical spin and magnetic moment.
Such
a system is said to be a "phyton." Dense ensembles of phytons are said
to approximate a simplified model of the physical vacuum field.

When the phytons are spin- compensated, their
orientation
within the ensemble is arbitrary. But when a charge q is the
source
of disturbance, the action produces a charge polarization of the
vacuum,
as prescribed by quantum electrodynamics. When a mass m is the
source
of disturbance, the phytons produce symmetrical oscillations along the
axis given by the direction of the disturbance. The vacuum then enters
a state characterized by the oscillation of the phytons along their
longitudinal
spin- polarization; this is interpreted as a gravitational field (G-
field).
The gravitational field is thus the result of vacuum decompensation
arising
at its point of polarization — which is an idea that was originally
introduced
by Sakharov. Given that the gravitational field is characterized by
longitudinal
waves, it cannot be screened, which is in accordance with observation
and
experiment. Hence m- disturbance produces the G- field, much as
q-
disturbance produces the electromagnetic field.

Akimov et al. go further. Following a
thesis advanced
by Roger Penrose, they represent the vacuum equations in the spinor
form
and thereby obtain a system of nonlinear spinor equations where two-
component
spinors represent the potentials of torsion fields. These equations can
describe charged as well as neutral quantum and classical particles.
They
thus allow that the vacuum field is disturbed not only by charge and
mass,
but also by classical spin. In that event the phytons oriented in the
same
direction as the spin of the disturbance keep their orientation. Those
opposite to the spin of the source undergo inversion; then the local
region
of the vacuum transits into a state of transverse spin polarization.
This
gives the "spin field" (S- field), viewed as a condensate of fermion
pairs.

As a result Akimov et al. view
the vacuum
as a physical medium that can assume various polarization states. Given
charge polarization, the vacuum is manifested as the electromagnetic
field.
Given matter- polarization, it is manifested as the gravitational
field.
And given spin- polarization, the vacuum manifests as a spin- field.
All
fundamental fields known to physics correspond to specific vacuum
polarization-
states.

Thus the above "torsion- field theory of the
physical
vacuum" can claim that all objects, from quanta to galaxies, create
vortices
in the vacuum. The vortices created by particles and other material
objects
are information carriers, linking physical events quasi-
instantaneously.
The group- speed of these "torsion- waves" is of the order of 109 C
— one billion times the speed of light. Since not just physical
objects,
also the neurons in our brain create and receive torsion- waves, not
only
particles are "informed" of each other's presence (as in the famous EPR
experiments), also humans can be so informed: our brain, too, is a
vacuum-
based "torsion- field transceiver." This suggests a physical
explanation
not only of quantum non- locality, but also of telepathy, remote
viewing,
and the other telesomatic effects discussed above.[22]

Torsion waves both superluminal and enduring.
Meta-stable
"torsion- phantoms" generated by spin- torsion interaction can persist
even in the absence of the objects that generated them. The existence
of
these phantoms has been confirmed in the experiments of Vladimir
Poponin
and his team at the Institute of Biochemical Physics of the Russian
Academy
of Sciences.[23](see
P.P.Gariaev, K.V. Grigor'ev, A.A. Vasil'ev, V.P. Poponin and V.A.
Shcheglov,
"Investigation of the fluctuation dynamics of DNA solutions by laser
correlation
spectro- scopy," in Bulletin of the Lebedev Physics Institute
No.
11- 12, 1999, pp. 23- 30; V.P. Poponin, "Modeling of NLE dynamics in
one
dimensional anharmonic FPU- lattice", Physics Letters A .)

Poponin, who has since repeated the
experiment at
the Heartmath Institute in the US, placed a sample of a DNA molecule
into
a temperature controlled chamber and subjected it to a laser beam. He
found
that the electromagnetic field around the chamber exhibits a specific
structure,
more or less as expected. But he also found that this structure
persists
long after the DNA itself has been removed from the laser- irradiated
chamber:
the DNA's imprint in the field continues to be present when the DNA is
no longer there. Poponin and his collaborators conclude that the
experiment
shows that a new field structure has been triggered from the physical
vacuum.
This field is extremely sensitive; it can be excited by a range of
energies
close to zero. The phantom effect is a manifestation, they claim, of a
hitherto overlooked vacuum substructure.

Theories such as those we have cited here
foreshadow a
major leap in the scientific world picture: the physical foundations of
the universe acquire an active role in all its functions and processes.
Life, and even mind, is a manifestation of the constant if subtle
interaction
of the wave-packets classically known as "matter" with the underlying
physically
real zero- point vacuum field.

If the emerging world picture is to be
completed, we must
evolve an explicit hypothesis to describe the basic dynamics of the
overall
range of matter-vacuum interaction. In this writer's "quantum- vacuum
interaction
(QVI) hypothesis," the non- classical energy field of the vacuum
(consisting
of scalar as well as electromagnetic wave propagations) registers the
spacetime
behavior and evolution of matter- energy systems in the form of
interfering
wavefronts. The conserved interference patterns form a holographic
information
field accessible to systems with a stereodynamic pattern isomorphic to
the systems that produced the patterns. The applicable process can be
described
as forward and reverse Fourier (more exactly, Gabor) transforms. Hence
matter- energy systems ranging from quanta to complex atomic,
molecular,
cellular and multicellular structures, including human brains, decode
("read
out") the information they and analogous systems have encoded ("read
into")
the field. Given that wavefronts superpose in multiple dimensions, the
ZPF of the vacuum acts as an information- conserving and transmitting
universal
holofield, intercon- necting systems with each other, as well as with
their
subsidiary systems (internal parts) and suprasystems (external
environments).[24]

Conclusions The astonishing psi- phenomena that come to
light
in controlled experiments, and the equally astonishing findings of
expert
psychotherapists cannot be dismissed as mere chimera, figments of a
fertile
but undisciplined imagination. The findings are part and parcel of the
manifestation of human consciousness: an entity whose subconscious
domains
extend far beyond the confines of the subject's brain and organism.

The findings may be real, yet their acceptance
hinges
critically on discovering ways to connect them with the received
frameworks
of knowledge. As long as there is no conceivable tie between an anomaly
and the basic paradigm that frames knowledge in the pertinent field,
the
anomaly will remain just that: a paradoxical, uncomprehended item,
relegated
to the back shelf of the science establishment. Recognition of a
conceivable
tie could, however, make for a significant difference — it could open
up
feasible avenues of conceptual analysis, theory- formulation, and
experimental
testing. For that reason likely hypotheses of brain- brain and brain-
universe
(or, in an alternative terminology, consciousness- consciousness, and
consciousness-
world) interaction need to be seriously scrutinized, for intrinsic
meaningfulness,
consistency with observations, as well as mesh with the currently known
frameworks of explanation.

In the here discussed case the scientific
validation of
the findings would have an additional bonus. Not only would it
introduce
greater coherence into our world picture — binding together the
hitherto
anomalous findings of consciousness research with our knowledge of the
physical world — it would also introduce greater coherence into human
affairs.
As thoughtful observers have frequently remarked, many of our current
ills
are due to the sense of separateness and lack of empathy we experience
vis- à- vis our fellow humans and the nonhuman realms of nature
(in modern societies, as Woody Allen quipped, "nature and I are two").
The scientist's recognition that we do have deeper ties to each other
and
to the natural environment could make a significant impact on the
media,
and therewith on the dominant attitudes of the public.

T.S. Eliot asked, "What are the roots that
clutch, what
branches grow out of this stony rubbish? Son of man you cannot say, or
guess, for you know only a heap of broken images..." Perhaps, the
exploration
of our subtle ties with each other and with nature could enable us to
know
more than a heap of broken images. It could help us to recognize
Bateson's
"pattern that connects": the subtle connecting pattern present in the
cosmos
and in the biosphere — and likewise in our brain and consciousness.